


The Only Exception

by socialclimb (sunsh1neriptide)



Category: Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance
Genre: M/M, One Shot, i just really love paramore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-08
Updated: 2019-04-08
Packaged: 2020-01-06 18:42:09
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18394145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sunsh1neriptide/pseuds/socialclimb
Summary: The idea of love had always terrified Mikey before he met Pete.





	The Only Exception

**Author's Note:**

> hi here's a short thing based off of the only exception by paramore obviously. i wrote this a while ago but i really love it so,, enjoy lmao :)

Mikey was only six when his parents got divorced.

To say the absolute least, it was hell. It was screaming and crying and Gerard having to sleep in Mikey's bed because the latter was too terrified to even move on some nights; it was their mom drinking too much wine at dinner and throwing her empty glass at their father and their father yelling forbidden words at their mother when they both thought the kids were asleep, but they weren't, they were hiding up at the top of the staircase and watching their entire life crumble before them.

Yet whenever Mikey came up to them the next day, pretending that he'd slept snug and sound through the screaming matches that had taken place in the living room the previous night, his parents would always tell him that they were in love and that everything was the same as it always was.

Again and again and again and again, Mikey's parents would fight all night and lie all day and it just left poor little Mikey crying himself to sleep at night, because if this was what love really was, he didn't want anything to do with it.

If being in love included despising your partner, then what was the point, anyways?

So it was six in the morning and Mikey woke up on someone's couch. The past year had been rounds and rounds of one night stands and drunken hookups in order to cope with the stress of college and his ever-worsening case of depression, and he never let anything happen after waking up the morning after. There were no goodbyes, no phone numbers exchanged, no nothings, just Mikey sneaking out before his partner woke up.

Mikey couldn't do relationships, because those almost always ended in falling in love. And falling in love was a shitty, horrible, terrifying thing.

Falling into rabbit holes, however, was a different story.

Hyper-fixation on things was normal. It was normal to see something once and become obsessed, to fall down a rabbit hole and dig your way deeper and deeper into the heart of your fixation, but never before had it happened to Mikey with a person, specifically one he'd found at some niche cafe downtown. Portland was weird, but Pete Wentz was weirder, and this wasn't falling in love, it was fixation. And the subject of said fixation just so happened to want to sleep with Mikey, so what?

Mikey'd been with Pete for just over two months then, seeing other people behind Pete's back when he wasn't available because they didn't have a relationship, it was just having sex and going home afterwards and doing it over again like it had always been for Mikey. It's just that time, it was with the same person more often.

It always fucking rained in the Northwest, so it was raining right then, the droplets tapping against Pete's apartment window rhythmically. Relatively speaking, it was a beautiful day outside.

Mikey sat up, rubbing his eyes. He had a killer hungover from the night before, which he could barely remember in the first place, and he wondered where Pete kept his painkillers.

He made his way over to the kitchen and poured himself a glass of water; he noticed that Pete had a lot of shit hanging on his fridge, from drawings in crayon to family photographs. Most of the photos were old, the date in the corner tracing back to the early 2000s and the pictures themselves of Pete and his siblings as children, but some of them were evidently newer.

And Mikey had no idea why, but right above the ice dispenser was a polaroid of Mikey himself. He didn't remember being in that photo as he was probably drunk out of his mind when it was taken, considering he was smiling like an idiot in it instead of displaying his nasty sober self. There was heart with an arrow through it around Mikey's face in the photo and goddamn, was that the cutest thing anyone had ever done for him.

It made Mikey feel a little fuzzy inside, which wasn't a feeling he was used to having while sober. Mikey didn't have a crush on Pete, because Mikey didn't do relationships, and even if he did have a stupid fucking crush, he'd repress it until it went away. Just like always.

"Mikey," came a sleepy voice from the couch, and Mikey looked over.

"Yeah?" Mikey responded, making his way over and sitting down in an adjacent armchair. "Are you okay?"

"You're still here," Pete said, evidently still half-asleep, and he rolled over and yawned. "I'm glad you're here."

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"Because you leave sometimes without waking me up, and it sucks." Pete propped his head up on the armrest and smiled at Mikey. "I like it when you stay."

"Then I'll stay."

Mikey had never been in a real relationship before, unless you included that one girl in ninth grade that Mikey honestly didn't even remember anymore. Long story short, it only lasted two weeks because the girl told Mikey she loved him and Mikey freaked out and dumped her like the weirdo he was. He hadn't been anyone's boyfriend ever since then.

"Hey," Mikey said, and Pete groaned in response. "I have a question."

"What?"

"Am I your boyfriend?"

"Well," Pete responded, yawning again, "do you want to be my boyfriend?"

Pete's brown eyes were wide and hopeful and Mikey's gut twisted into a knot; his instincts were screaming at him to say no, but every other part of his body wanted him to say yes.

"I don't know," Mikey settled on instead, taking a sip from the glass of water that he was still holding. "I'm just scared."

"That's okay," Pete said, smiling gently. "I get it. Relationships can be really scary."

Mikey sighed, running a hand through his hair. "It's one of my biggest fears," he admitted. "Commitment. And falling in love. God, sorry, it's not that I don't like you, it's just that I'm a baby and I'm afraid."

"No, no, I get it," Pete said, and he sat up, clutching his head at first. "Damn, head rush. But it's okay, I swear. I'm okay with taking it slow, we can do this however you want, and I'll help you through it. I'm gonna be here."

Mikey relocated next to Pete and leaned into him; Pete rubbed his shoulder and kissed him on the forehead.

"It's so stupid," Mikey mumbled. "So fucking stupid. I've never believed in love. I've been convinced pretty much my whole life that I'd never fall in love, and now I'm confused and scared and I don't know what to do."

"It's not stupid."

"It is."

"It's not," Pete reassured him, reaching for Mikey's hand and holding it in his own, twining their fingers together. "You just need help believing, which is what I'm here for."

"You'll be my only exception," Mikey mumbled, setting his water down on the coffee table and curling up into a ball. "I think I like that."

"I like it, too."

Mikey leaned up and kissed his lover softly, wrapping his arm around Pete's neck. The rain continued tapping at the window, which made for a peaceful atmosphere, and when Mikey pulled away Pete touched their foreheads together.

"When do you have to go?" Pete asked, praying it wasn't any time soon. "Because I don't have to do anything until later."

"What time is it?" Mikey replied, and Pete pulled back to check his phone for the time.

"Almost seven."

"Then we have time." Mikey smiled, which was incredibly rare, and he kissed Pete on the cheek. "It's weird. I never stay this long."

"It's a good weird." Pete squeezed Mikey's hand and then grabbed the TV remote from the coffee table. "Let's watch a movie. Any requests?"

"Surprise me."

Mikey liked to think that this was the road to believing. It had to be.


End file.
